Nationally acclaimed author to speak at Delta

Nationally acclaimed author Maxine Hong Kingston will come to Delta College for a Writer’s Workshop from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, April 14 in the West Forum.

The author will also offer a talk in the Tillie Lewis Theatre at 1 p.m.

Hong Kingston is a treasure to the Stockton community.

She is a first generation Chinese American who was born and raised here.

She graduated from Edison High School and later went on to college at University of California, Berkeley where she received a bachelor’s degree in English literature.

She later received her teaching credential and became a teacher in Hawaii for ten years before becoming a famous author.

Hong Kingston has written many novels and has received numerous awards for her work.

This isn’t her first time returning to Stockton.

“I often come to Stockton, as most of my family live there. It’s a good chance for me to see my family and teach writing. Bringing my private and public lives together,” said Hong Kingston in an email interview.

Stockton Unified School District has named a school after Hong Kingston. The author says she feels a responsibility to look after that school and it’s students.

Her first published book and most famous novel is “The Woman Warrior: Memoirs of a Girlhood Among Ghosts,” which was released in 1976.

She later published, “China Men” and “Tripmaster Monkey,” among others.

During the writer’s workshop Hong Kingston will give an exercise she has previously used in her Veteran Writer’s Group.

She will also give an overview of the writer and poet’s life.

“I expect it will be much like working with students and writers at Berkeley, Sebastopol, Hong Kong, Boston, Paris, everywhere,” said Hong Kingston when asked how it feels to come back to work with the Stockton Community. “Creative people — artists — are the ones who make beauty, and keep the world alive. It’s always good being with them.”

Hong Kingston’s projects continue to make their way to the public.

She just recently published “I Love a Broad Margin to My Life” and said she deserves a rest now.

“I have begun something though,” she said. “But it is a baby, and not ready to be talked about.”

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The Collegian is the student newspaper of San Joaquin Delta College in Stockton, Calif. The paper is published six times a semester in the fall and spring.

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